I love animals. And as a result, I suppose, as with humans, few animals are indifferent to me. Most think I’m swell. But some, like humans, want to kill me. The latter are the source of several notable scars, including my second (#1 was the infamous exploding milk bottle).

My buddy Stevie possessed three things of which I was deeply jealous: red hair, freckles, and Rin Tin Tin. OK, so it wasn’t the actual hero dog of TV fame, just a garden variety German Shepherd. But he was a dead ringer for the real “Rinty.”

So one day we decided to act out an improvised Rin Tin Tin adventure in Stevie’s backyard. Stevie’s dad was a Scout leader, so there was a stack of unused Cub Scout caps just itching to be played with. But how? Aha! I would sit on the back porch holding them hostage while Stevie held the noble Rinty back. Then Stevie would yell, “Go get ‘em, boy!” and Rinty would run up to me, “rescuing” the caps from my grasp one at a time, and take them back to Rusty at Fort Apache. Stevie’s red hair made him Rusty, so I was the default bad guy. Which I didn’t mind because having Rinty rip cap after cap out of my hand until there were noneleft was a hoot!

“Until there were none left.” That was where things went awry. Rinty was apparently a fan of his namesake series, so he knew that once you’d rescued the captives, you had to deal with the villain. That would be me. So, after slobbering the last hostage into Stevie’s hands, Rinty turned and ran at me full speed, claws and teeth ablaze, in full Saturday morning adventure mode!

I woke up in an emergency room several hours later with, surprisingly, only 11 stitches in my face (now just a couple of pale lines at the end of my nose.) I had conflicted feelings about Rinty after that. On the one hand, I was convinced it wasn’t his fault, on the other, I was afraid to ever go near him again. Sadly, my friendship with Stevie began to fade around the same time.

On the plus side, I learned several things about working with canine thespians:

19 Responses to My Scar Stories

we learn so much from our childhood – can insurance companies deny insurance based on your blog admissions about your need to have physical reminders every time you go on a new adventure? They also could learn so much from your childhood!

We once had the toddler playing on the backyard with the dog looking out for him. My husband and his buddy decided they were going to play rangers or something and sneak up on the poor kid. I told them to leave the peaceful scene undisturbed, but you know how men can be. They belly crawled through the bushes trying to be sneaky and quiet, but before they got halfway across, the dog launched silently and just bit them both on the rear end. When the poor dog realized who they were I think he felt bad, but I told him not. 🙂

Yikes. I recently was bit by a supposedly friendly dog. A huge one under a table where a friend and I were playing chess. My friend, feeling cramped, wanted his dog to move, but the big Alaskan something-or-other wouldn’t. So since dogs have always loved me, I began to pat it under the table while gently nudging it to a way out. Chomp! Almost broke the skin. Ah well, maybe I’m losing my, er, touch.

Ruh-roh! Amazing you didn’t lose your love of animals!
We had an Australian Shepherd who was extremely devoted to me. Once while walking her, someone I knew (but she didn’t) ran toward me. Thankfully I had a good grip on her leash, or else my friend might have lost his face. I’m sure after that, my friend thought twice before running toward women with protective dogs.